One of my most sexual experiences involved my ears. It was a wintry Saturday afternoon, and while I painted in a cramped makeshift studio, my lover sat on the floor and read to me from a Japanese book of sex called something like The Jade Palace – a slim volume of text that was a literary voyage into the art of lovemaking.

It was cliterature in a way I'd never heard it before. It was the Joy of Sex meets Eastern poetry. It was the Marquis de Sade meets Karma Sutra. It totally blew me away. After an hour I could barely stand I was so turned on. My gentle waters had begun to flow from my jade palace so to speak.

And he'd not laid a finger on me.

A few days ago, I was recounting this story to Miss America and co. I was excited about a phrase I'd thought of that reminded me of the Jade Palace session and seemed to aptly describe the physical sensation that happens to one's lady parts when one is aroused:

'The blossoming vagina,' I hummed, using my cupped hands to demonstrate as best I could a budding flower. 'Isn't it beautiful?'

'Oh for godssakes,' Miss America muttered over her wine. 'That's so fucking Mills and Boon you should be ashamed of yourself. You might as well start calling your genitals “petal” and a cock a “hard rod of love” Give me “wet cunt” any day.'

I was won out. By general consensus, it was agreed that 'blossoming vagina' was not sexy sex lingo and that only certain words constituted successful dirty talk. Along with 'penis', 'discharge' and 'jugs', 'vagina' is not one of them.

And really, I have to admit, the phrase 'Honey, please lick my vagina' has a decidedly different ring to it to than purring 'Baby, I need you to eat my pussy now'.

Nevertheless, it got me thinking about naughty words and how stringing together a sentence of well-chosen, well-delivered filth gets most people hotter than a whore in hell.

From the very first time my very first lover begged me to say the word 'pussy' I've felt the rush of the power words have over stimulating that most excellent sex organ of all - the brain. After all, if statistics are to be believed over 80% of sex happens in that little grey mass of love.

Shouldn't we be whispering sweet somethings to it?

But what constitutes our personal experience of lust and the words we use to describe it, is an intensely intimate matter. While Miss America divulged her predilection for the term 'wet cunt', nobody else would volunteer any detail about what turned them on verbally.

I suppose we don't share this side with the world because it says a lot about our psychology. Unfortunately, we don't often share it with our partners either. Many people aren't able to express their desires to their partners, let alone play with words as an aphrodisiac.

Women especially have their tongues tied in this regard.

We've been taught to be demure in bed and not demand or express what turns us on. We're taught that ladies are not crude, do not say 'cunt' or 'pussy' or 'slap me there daddy-o'. In fact, ladies are not verbal at all and that descriptions should be slight, lest we sound like sluts and prostitutes.

Or if being called a slut is what turns us on, we choose not to say anything in case we betray some notion of feminist integrity.

So, instead, we slip into mute mode, only opening our mouths to speak once the deed is done.

It's a pity, because there's so much fun to be had. After all, sex is meant to be fun, right?Through words you can explore in role-play; you can express your sexuality, encourage and compliment; most importantly, you can laugh at the cringe-worthy and embrace the bloopers.

And my God, there are bloopers of buzz-kill proportions. One guy I knew would slip into a Barry-White-wears-tiger-print-speedo voice while telling me what he planned to do with my 'sexy widdle' toes. I still shudder. Just not my thing you know.

But hey, at least he was able to move on to a woman that had pretty feet and a spandex fetish.

For myself, I'm pretty tame when it comes to bedroom talk. I don't do running commentary and I don't scream and shout from the rafters. But I do remember the days when I was too shy to say anything. It was a sorry state of affairs with me silently wondering where to slot in a word (Now? um.. Now?) or even if I could.

Thank God for those two little words whispered in my ear by my very first love: Say 'pussy'.

Follow me on my blog, here or on Twitter here